


Comitatus

by DollyPop



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Canon - Manga, Canon Compliant, Character Study, F/M, Light Angst, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-28
Updated: 2015-11-28
Packaged: 2018-05-03 19:55:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5304761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DollyPop/pseuds/DollyPop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The moon looked like the blade of a scythe, like a guillotine swaying in promise, leaking blood, a sliver curved like a sideways smirk. </p><p>And Marie is in his hands. And he knows he has to throw her.</p><p>Spirit was already up there. His students.</p><p>How much more were they expecting for him to ruin and leave for that senseless war?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Comitatus

_"When the bomb arrives, there'll be no where left to hide. Yeah when the bomb arrives_  
_there'll be no one left behind."_  
~Big Data

* * *

 He knows he has to.

When he got the command, he knew there wasn’t much left that they could do, save for finding some other way to go back to the moon, and hell if the witches were willing to help them return to that graveyard. He wouldn’t be in the position if it weren’t for the wolf’s mistake, which left Spirit high in the blood sky that could prove his tomb. He had to have faith in those kids, but he knew they’d saved more than they should, in the past. And he couldn’t help but admit that, after he found himself back on the ground, when he saw Marie’s relieved face, her soul growing so huge in her chest, looking like it were ready to burst, he was almost content with the mistake of landing back on Earth.

When he got the command, he didn’t realize what it entailed. He almost didn’t register the order, his earpiece still a little frazzled. It wasn’t until he turned and spotted Azusa transforming and how they were getting Kilik to fill in for Sid that he realized what the orders were.

_“All long range weapons, prepare for fire.”_

He catalogued what they had. No shotguns, and even if they had any, the accuracy of them would be shoddy, at best. Perhaps with the witch’s help, they’d stand a sliver of a chance to hit the Kishin, but Azusa was their best bet. He watches how Kilik, just a boy, comes over and gets himself into position because Sid was still on the moon and he thinks it's a good choice, to have Kilik fill in. Both he and Sid had similar wavelengths, strong, devoted, loyal and protective: Azusa could easily resonate with either of them. He looked over the other Death Scythes. An axe, a lamp. What else was there that could land a solid hit on the Kishin from all the way down on Earth?

As if hearing him, and he wouldn’t be surprised if she could read him like a book, she knew him down to the very soul, she turned.

When Marie looked at him, he didn’t notice, didn’t feel her eye focused on him. He was too busy squinting up at the moon, wondering how Azusa could possibly be enough. It was only when he felt her tender soul touch against his, asking for resonance that he stared back at her and saw her face set.

Everything inside of him froze, his bloodstream stopping, his lungs inflating and staying pressed into his ribcage, his heart pausing mid-thump so it felt pressed against his sternum.

He didn’t even need to open his mouth to convey how much he didn’t want her to do that. Death would have to drag him through hell, first. He’d sooner fashion a slingshot from saplings and a rubber band and catapult just about anyone else up to the abyss. The moon looked like the blade of a scythe, like a guillotine swaying in promise, leaking blood, a sliver curved like a sideways smirk.

Spirit was already up there. His students. Wasn’t that enough? How much more were they expecting to ruin and leave for the senseless war? How much was he expected to fling aside?

The temporary peace he’d felt shattered and he shuttered his soul to her, refused her that comfort.

He _can’t_. He’d give up a lot. He was ready to give up too much. But not that. Not this. Not Marie and what she carried and what she meant.

The answer was no. She felt it crack in her marrow and she couldn’t accept it and he knows that, too. Because this was Marie who’d walk a path of thorns in bare feet for the people she loved, who suffered for them, who was more resilient than anyone would ever give her credit for but damnit, he’d pushed her out of the bullet that was that battle, already.

But she was a Death Scythe. No retirement, yet. She had a commitment, one she was clever enough to notice, and she always saw her duties through. He knew her too well to believe that she’d abandon anyone. But had she no sense of preservation? He was reminded of Brew, again, of Marie ready to throw herself back into that tempest because she left no one behind and nothing unfinished. He wouldn’t watch her walk to her death back then, either.

How could she ever expect for him to throw her to it? How did she think he could live if something happened and her blood and worse was on his hands? Spirit was alone up there without a Meister and she was expecting him to launch her into her grave with him?

He looks into her face, searching for answers.

It isn’t the shortest glance they’ve ever shared, talking without words. His frown is deeper than he wants to admit and her eye is warm and apologetic but determined. She is set. Her muscles are already tense and she is shaking, but she is ready. No one else is looking at them. No one else expects her to go up there. No one would judge or say anything if she stayed with him, safe.

What a hypocrite she was.

She’d told him she’d resurrect him herself and murder him twice over if he pulled some sort of sacrificial offering to save her or anyone else and now she was thinking he was going to aid her in flinging her to her death? He wanted to tell her that she didn’t count as a weapon that had to prepare for fire. She’s a hammer: she was classified as a specialized, short-range weapon best suited for melee, his personal specialty.

(And she should be, besides. He’d made her what she was. He knew Izuna in every piece of him, helped develop it, helped make it twice as powerful with his own electric soul, made the two of them a current and conductor and outlet running lighting between them until it was ready to burst out.)

He had the facts. He _knew_ her, knew her soul, knew her destruction, knew what they could create together: fury and ruin as well as hope and a warm, flickering soul.

He knew her weapon form. He knew what damage he could do, how much help they could be, how important it was. Even a single hit from her could provide enough opening to win the battle.

He knew he could get her to the moon. Might even have the accuracy to land the hit on the first try. The problem isn’t how.

The problem was actually going through with it.

He is unblinking, not backing down as his gaze bores down into her own, and she almost winces. He doesn’t know what to do. Didn’t he push her back? Didn’t he lie about being at the capacity to use Izuna? Didn’t he get her off the moon, keep her safe, make sure she and her precious cargo were free from any scars and wounds? Hadn’t he done enough? 

She doesn’t mouth ‘ _please?_ ’. She doesn’t ask anything of him. He knows what he must weigh against what.

He wasn’t a moral man. He’d watch the world burn so long as he had his lab, and the people who never abandoned him. He’d be fine with it. The lives of some that he cared for far outweighed the many. He was not selfless. He was not kind by nature. He horded that which he cared for, scalpels long since rusted and unusable, papers of failed experiments, photographs. He was a doctor but the greater good did not concern him, couldn’t concern him. Selfishness, perhaps, was what many would call it, but he doesn’t care about the many.

Had he his way.

Had he his way, he wouldn’t even blink.

But that kind of world would be diseased. That godless world. The Lord has given his command and he made a promise so very long ago to follow through with it. He made that choice.

She knew even before he did what he would do.

When Marie transforms, she feels heavy for the first time in over a decade. He doesn’t want to wield her, not for that. But he turns to Eruka, he tells her he needs coordinates, he informs her that he can get Marie to the moon.

They’d have to time it right. The Kishin would see her flying for him from a mile away, so Azusa would have to be the distraction. He refused to throw her up there without every safety net in the books. He had to hope that Spirit or Sid or anyone else would catch her. If she comes back (when, when she comes back, it has to be when) and tells him she had a harsh landing, he’d have to dig out his operating table and use it on the living, again.

He only had one good shot, so he hoped that frog-witch knew what she was doing.

Marie’s wavelength poured through him, broke through those thoughts, sucked away the bloodlust. She is knowing and accepting and sweet against his palm before she steels herself and Izuna tendrils through him, again. He’d need every ounce of physical strength he could muster to throw her up there, and the electricity buzzed through him until he felt light but flightless.

Even then, even grudgingly resolved, everything screams for him not to go through with it. Everything aches so deeply, down in his very marrow, down beyond the core of his bones. His fingers are familiar on her, knowing, practiced. They don’t want to let go.

She has to prepare herself. He has to prepare. They’re both so tired. He closes his eyes and intensifies his wavelength, wrapping it around her soul until she does the same and they’re twined as closely as possible and he doesn’t _have_ to speak to her. They know each other without words: know each other through hands on shoulders, on hips, through locked gazes and soft smiles and a resonance so powerful it crackles the very air. She knows everything he has to say and everything he will never vocalize and she swears to him she’ll come back.

She gives no thanks.

She gives no ‘ _I love you_ ’, and he thinks it’s better that way. He thinks he wouldn’t let go if she did, and wouldn’t say anything in reply, either.

His muscles are ready, he only has a narrow window to accomplish the throw, and when he opens his mouth and tells that witch that they’re ready, that he needs the coordinates, he feels something in him stutter until Marie’s soul, twined with him, so close he doesn’t know where there is “she” or “I” or if they have simply become “we”, in that moment, smoothes it over.

He throws her. Throws her with all his might, and Izuna leaves him at the last possible moment, right when his fingers barely skim her leaving handle, yearning to hold on, and she is flying high into the cloudless sky to what could be her coffin.

He feels boneless immediately, but he has to hold the resonance. He has to. She needs the strength to pound her wavelength into the Kishin, to slam into him with every ounce of force she has. He straightens, staring up into the sky where everything he has ever given a damn about could stay.

He holds the resonance, he feels her annoyance when she has to turn herself around. He feels her scream, her fury a battle cry echoing in his nerves.

The resonance is draining him but he can’t release it. He won’t. He needs that reassurance.

He knew he had to.  

His hand clenches, leaving the barest of spaces.

And it feels empty.

**Author's Note:**

> Slowly, but surely, my late behind is uploading everything I wrote for Soul Eater Angst Week. The prompt was "Orders are Orders".


End file.
